Career Success Investigation

This paper investigates how researchers have responded to requests to encourage a broader definition of career success by conducting research with underrepresented groups. It investigates the sample populations that are researched, and the type of work experience that is studied, by reviewing 89 articles in journals concerned with the construct of career success from 1992 to 2009. The paper finds that such research principally focuses on managers, professionals and administrators, and the work-related experience considered is almost exclusively situated in the domain of paid employment, particularly full-time employment. It argues that the definition of career success tends to only relate to those in paid employment (predominantly full-time), and, by extension, those who are not in this realm do not have career success. Researchers are encouraged to incorporate those with non-traditional employment arrangements and those in non-paid work into studies. A call assisted by proffering a revised definition of career success